Fanshawe Grounds Weekend Blog

Sept. 15-17

Written By: Jennifer H. and Nicolai J. 

This is the first weekend duty shift this autumn and it happened to be sunny and warm all weekend; it still felt like summer. Out of the both of us, Nicolai had the most experience and was a tremendous help over the weekend.  Early Friday morning we arrived and were given the rundown on our weekend tasks and a quick walk through of the facilities. We were assigned an area by G building to start out with and then asked to continue through the Louise Weekes Garden. Most of the plants in this garden were donated by Louise Weekes, who was a passionate gardener herself, and when she passed away it was commemorated in her memory. 

Friday: So, first thing we decided was to clean up the garden bed by G building, before starting on the process of mulching. We picked up some garbage and thoroughly went through the bed digging out any weeds we could find. Half the bed wasn’t too bad, only a few weeds, but the other half was pretty weedy. Under all these weeds were some Astilbe (to the right of the Hydrangeas from the image - Figure 1) that were hiding out and were probably pretty grateful of the extra space they now had. We also deadheaded Hostas, pruned back some Holly bushes as they were getting pretty large, and cleared the few windows of the climbing Ivy. The last thing we wanted to do before mulching was to relocate some Hostas that were getting lost under the Holly bushes and to move some ‘mini’ Hostas to a more empty area. Then it was on to mulching. We made an edge around the bed, using a Dutch Hoe, extending the bed around the new cooling machine installed there recently to make it easier to mow later on. Nicolai went to pick up some mulch but unfortunately we ran out of time so the mulching was to be completed Saturday.   

                 

Saturday: Early Saturday morning, after getting all of our tools ready for the day, we got straight back to work. The first few hours were spent mulching yesterdays bed and we completed our first garden bed!

It was then time for us to move on to the Louise Weekes Garden. We started with the closest gardens near the doors and got to work with weeding and pruning the Ivory Silk Japanese Tree Lilac which was overhanging the walkway.

In the bed opposite of the Tree Lilac were some Ornamental Thistles that did not belong there and had migrated from a surrounding garden bed. We decided to keep them and moved them all to under the Tiger Eyes Sumac. We also edged and mulched both beds ending our second day.

Sunday: Our last duty shift for the weekend! We were headed back to the Louise Weekes garden to continue to clean up and mulch some more of the garden. Again we checked out our equipment and gathered our tools for the day before setting out. We chose the bed with the young Norway Spruce and the Bear’s Breeches. This bed had quite a bit of weeds to remove. Canadian Thistle and a type of grass, and also some more of the Ornamental Thistle which we consolidated into the middle of the bed (apparently this is where it was first planted). We removed the spent flowers of the Bear’s Breeches and some Daylilies before we started the edging. We edged and mulched the entire bed, taking care not to cover up some smaller Rose plants that had spread throughout one corner. We finished just after lunch and then it was time to clean up. We cleaned all our tools, the tool room, and made sure our work areas were also nice and tidy. Nicolai went to grab the Leaf Blower and finished up our work for the day cleaning up anything we might have missed. It was a beautiful weekend to be outside and I think we both enjoyed getting our hands dirty. Have a great week everyone!